By Mohammad Al-Ghazzi and Mohammad Al-Hashash
KUWAIT, March 3 (KUNA) -- In most world countries, school curricula taught at various stages play an integral role in acquainting the rising generations with the history and political facts of their country, thus offering guidance for the future; the proverb goes "those who do not learn from their history are doomed to repeat it."
Applying this to the history of the region, the 1990 invasion of Kuwait by the toppled Saddam Baathist regime comes at the forefront of relevant issues.
Kuwait has, so cautiously, dealt with facts of the 1990 invasion in school curricula. By the same token, school curricula in Iraq went through tremendous changes after Saddam was toppled, especially in what was related to Kuwait, to remove the intended "erroneous" information about the country.
Under Saddam, school curricula provided what was referred to as "false history and distorted curricula". Educational institutions were utterly dominated by the Saddam regime which promoted "Saddamist" thoughts and practices and glorified his policies and wars.
Once Saddam was ousted, the new Iraqi government introduced radical changes to the educational system and school curricula. The very start was destroying Saddam's pictures, then removing all aspects related to "socialist national party" culture of the Baathist regime.
Most of school curricula taught under the Saddam regime were abundant in Saddam's slogans, thoughts, and ideas. However, they were cancelled the first school year that followed his fall, paving the way for introducing new curricula.
"The (Iraqi) Ministry of Education scrapped whatever was relevant to the defunct regime and its grave errors," Minister of Education Khudeir Al-Khuzai said.
Former Minister of Education and Higher Education Sami Al-Muzfar said, " We changed all the curricula that glorified the former regime, especially the toppled president (Saddam), for they were mainly devoted to glorifying the regime and the thoughts of the president.
"Indeed, these ideas and concepts were scrapped as a first step following changes that swept the country and its political scene. They constituted an obstacle and did not reflect the thoughts of the Iraqi people, nor their conscience," said head of the Education and Teaching Committee at the Iraqi Parliament Alaa Meki.
He added they had also removed all maps and diagrams that were not in accordance with acknowledged facts at the international level, underscoring that the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait needed to be studied within "a comprehensive, civilized, national, and human view denouncing the invasion as an aggression against an Arab, Muslim, neighboring, and brotherly country."
One of Saddam's most aggressive "teachings" that he sought to promote through school curricula and the media was that his invasion to Kuwait was "a victory and a liberation", thus distorting facts to justify his faults. Thousands of maps were printed showing Kuwait as a part of Iraq, said director general of curricula at the Iraqi Ministry of Education Dr. Mohsen Eid.
"We scrapped whatever was related to the invasion of Kuwait from Iraqi school curricula on the first day of the change," Al-Kuzai said.
As for Kuwait, general inspector of social studies at the Ministry of Education, Hassan Hussein Ahmad, said no change could ever be introduced to the school curricula randomly "but in accordance with the country's higher policies as well as those of the region."
Asked about forms of coordination with Iraqi authorities to make sure school curricula there was free of anything against Kuwait, he said there were contacts between the foreign ministries in both countries to study the possibility of scrapping false data about Kuwait taught at Iraqi schools.
"I think they have responded to calls by the Kuwaiti Foreign Ministry to 'lessen the emotional burden in their curricula against Kuwait'. But, no change in terms of the formulation of curricula itself, has been introduced in Kuwaiti curricula," he added.
As for terms used to refer to the Iraqi invasion, Ahmad said there were three terms being studied at research center: "Arab solidarity", "Iraqi invasion", and "Saddamist invasion". The suitable term will be selected and used in school curricula.
Referring to study aspects of the invasion, he said one of these was "the crisis of burning the oil wells"; Kuwaiti schools celebrate every year the douzing of the last blazing oil well.
In addition, regular school trips are organized to museums so that students can see the impact of the invasion.
Asked if recent acts of aggression and sabotage by some Iraqi groups against Kuwaiti property at the border area can be comprised in school curricula, he said, "There are Baathist concepts fixed in the minds of some from which we will suffer for a long time. Wide bilateral relations on the human level are essential (to overcome them)."
Ahmad denied firmly any intention to overlook the Iraqi invasion in school curricula altogether, saying, "This part can never be forgotten or skipped no matter what positive developments occur in the relations between the two countries, but curricula will be re-formulated to cope with the current situation."
However, do the state's higher policies influence the school curricula?
Ahmad said the state aimed to provide students with "civilized" ideas, far from violence, and focusing on tolerance of others. This, he said, was the main concern of the curricula taught at Kuwaiti schools.
